Good News: Obama Admin. Diverts $500 Million To IRS For Obamacare

Remember, though, that Obamacare is somehow going to save the American people lots and lots of money

(The Hill) The Obama administration is quietly diverting roughly $500 million to the IRS to help implement the president’s healthcare law.

The money is only part of the IRS’s total implementation spending, and it is being provided outside the normal appropriations process. The tax agency is responsible for several key provisions of the new law, including the unpopular individual mandate.

Wait, back up: “only part of the IRS’s total implementation spending”? This begs the question “how much more do they need to spend?” $500 million might be chump change in Washington, but, here in Reality Land, that’s a lot of money. What exactly is it going to be spent on? And this begs another question “how much will implementation cost the private sector, money that could be otherwise used for hiring? What will it cost health care companies, money that could be otherwise used for health care?”

There was of course the meme about the IRS looking to hire 16,500 new agents to deal with the Mandate and other provisions of Obamacare. We know for a fact that the IRS is looking for 4,500 new agents, 4,000 for enforcement. And wanted $303 million just to implement all that Obamacare calls for in the “development of new systems and modifications of existing systems required to support new tax credits.”

If you have one federal agency needing at least half a billion dollars to implement Obamacare, what will this cost the private sector?

This also means, per the Hill article, that HHS is being left short of funding, as they are transferring much of this cash to the IRS.

Oh, and a thought occurs: what will this cost the private sector to implement?